| Rhetorical analysis is provided of speeches of the late Texas Congresswoman Barbara Charline Jordan in commemoration of the 30th anniversary of her famous Statement on Impeachment, delivered before the U.S. House Judiciary Committee on July 25, 1974. Between 1999 and 2003, four weeklong visits were made to the Barbara Jordan Archives, housed in Special Collections at the Robert J. Terry Library on the campus of Texas Southern University in Houston, Jordan's undergraduate alma mater. In addition, phone and/or personal interviews were conducted with persons who knew Jordan. Analysis focuses on the content, crafting, and delivery of Jordan's orations related to Watergate, patriotism, and equality. In addition to her impeachment testimony, Jordan's historic 1976 Democratic Convention Keynote Address is among the speeches examined.;Her persuasive oratory is viewed through various analytical lenses. First, it is considered as performance verbal art or as a type of poetics, with special attention given to her use of classical tropes and schemes, to her approaches to the five canons of rhetoric (inventio , dispositio, elocutio, memoria, and pronuntiatio), and also to the speeches' rational appeal (logos), emotional appeal (pathos ), and ethical appeal (ethos). Next, Jordan's oratory is viewed as women's political rhetoric. Discussion of her upbringing, education, and rather a-sexual life undergird the characterization of her political oratorical style as "masculine." The differences in media coverage of men and women politicians are explored.;The "Blackness" of Jordan's oratory also is considered. Various categories of Black political rhetoric are defined (such as assimilationist and liminalist), and a determination made as to how Jordan's oratory fits within these. She is characterized as an egalitarian consensus builder, with moderate positions on racial issues. The similarities of her oratorical style and that of the Black preacher during sermon delivery are highlighted. Finally, the issue of Jordan's patriotism is wrestled with. Following historical and current definitions of patriotism in the context of post-9/11/01 America, constituent letters related to the Nixon impeachment hearings are featured that both question and applaud Jordan's 'patriotic' rhetoric . |
